by Prof. Frieda Ekotto
Department of AfroAmerican and African Studies
UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN

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Program in International & Comparative Studies, International Institute
Wednesday 12-3pm

Human Rights and LGBTI in Sub-Saharan Africa

This course will approach human rights debates that revolve around gendered and sexualized violence, particularly as it pertains to LGBTI individuals in Sub-Saharan Africa. We will examine how laws serve to repress and mask the pain of disenfranchised subjects, and we will search for traces of what cannot be said in order to address and expose suffering from a variety of angles and reassess the position and agency of the dispossessed. By looking for silent cultural norms and the traces of what cannot be said, we will consider both cultural factors that lead to widespread homophobia and the suffering of individuals who are subject to its power. As part of this attention to unspoken assumptions, we will address preconceived notions about Sub-Saharan African cultures and the LGBTI individuals who live there.

To consider the relationship between legal systems and the silencing of individuals, we consider how and why governments seek to criminalize private activities that do not infringe upon the rights of others or in any way justify the intervention of the state. We will read theoretical and primary texts and watch films that analyze and critique an essential paradox in our attitude to privacy: some see no problem when a state, in the absence of any proven harm, tramples on privacy in cases of homosexuality, but find no contradiction when the same state is reluctant to violate the sanctity of the private sphere in instances of extraordinary harm, such as domestic violence against women and children, a scourge that blights the lives of many. We will also consider how taking a balanced approach to the right to privacy is made even more complicated by the fact that attitudes towards privacy are often shaped by culture or religion, and thus by deeply held beliefs.

Course themes will include the study of violence and other human rights abuses that stems from homophobia in relation to the following: cultural and political iterations of private and public space; violence perpetrated or condoned by states (such as violence by law enforcement and criminal justice systems); depictions of LGBTI individuals in popular media sources; and the silencing of the voices of LGBTI individuals who wish to speak about their lived experiences. These themes draw from current and groundbreaking conversations about LGBTI issues in Sub-Saharan Africa, which have heretofore been left unaddressed.

In addition, while we will focus our attention of Sub-Saharan Africa, students will be asked to reflect upon similar debates that are current in the United States. For example students will apply insights we gain through our theoretical observations to similar topics in the United States, and, in addition to considering local factors, students will consider how international relations—such as the activity of the Christian right in Sub-Saharan Africa or, by contrast, pressure from figures such as Hilary Clinton and Ban Ki-moon, both of whom have made statements against homophobia—become part of human rights conversations within Africa and impact the lives of LGBTI individuals.